This is a bhakti issue, and concludes with two
very moving videos. The Heart Sutra chant is accompanied by
Hubble images from space. The music for the Amma video is
Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah. Oh yes, and the "darshan of food".

"We sit in this courtyard, two
forms,shadow outlines with one soul,

birdsound, leaf moving, early
eveningstar, fragrant damp, and the sweet

sickle curve of moon.
You and I in around, unselved idling in the garden-

beauty
detail. The raucous parrotslaugh, and we laugh inside
laughter,

the two of us on a bench in Konya, yetamazingly in Khorasan
and Iraq as well,

friends abiding this form, yet alsoin another
outside of time, you and I."

In the spring shedrops the seeds, hecovers them. He digs up
the weeds.She cuts the flowers.She takes the bloomsand puts them in
every room. They soarred from the tables, sproutyellow from the
shelves,hang purple from the ceiling, bluefrom the edges of
lampshades. Clustersof flowers sit in tiny pots on
everywindowsill, in opencupboards, behindthe sink. He
standsbeside her as she tosses all the wilted leavesinto a rusty
bucket.This house is heaven'sdoor, the air gathering the bashful
smells of blossoms, roots, cutstems, wet dirt, newand rotting
leaves.

Thanks Ben ...Yes, South Indian food
(as well as Salad Vegetables) are my favourite foods. Unfortunately, the
nearest South Indian Restaurant is just over 100 miles away!

Yeah, here we have none at all. There are
some Indian restaurants in Hasselt, Maatricht, Liege and Aachen but they are
mostly Tandoori restaurants.There is one Southern Indian restaurant in
Amsterdam; they even sell vegetarian dosa. The best South Indian food I ate
in, well, tah tah, South India...(surprise, surprise!)And of all the places
I ate the best food was in the Ramanashramam, Anandaashram of swami Ramdas (not
to be confused with Ramdass of Be Here Now), and in the ashram of sri sadhu Om
also in Tiru. There lives a Lady there in ashram of sadhu Om and she gives her
'darshan' through food. There is a story behind this.When I was there the
last time I was reading some works by sadhu Om. I went to the samadhi of
Muruganar and sadhu Om and did pradakshina of their tombs. The day before my
departure a friend there, Rumi, a Tamil man--I lived in his compound at the
time--told me I could go there for books and food. The Lady there brought the
food and I ate it. I felt that when I ate the food it was a blessing or darshan.
Also Yogi Ramsuratkumarashram had very good food--also darshan through
food.Basically it had the same quality as the food my mother cooks! The most
important ingredients being love and attention. My mother cooks sattvica food.
She is also vegetarian.Sri Ramana was also involved with the kitchen work.
He did this so his teaching would be eaten by the residents and visitors!At
least, that is my conviction. When I read the Power of the Presence series my
intuition about this was confirmed.In those books one can learn a lot about
what was going on there at the time Sri Ramana still lived there in his bodily
form. He was not at all the silent, aloof jnani some people think. He was also a
great bhakta, like a Mother, always keen on the well-being of his
visitors.Sometimes when visitors came and he was doing construction work, or
whatever was being done at the moment he said: 'I have to go back to jail.' He
felt imprisoned sometimes.There is one story I recently read. There was a
western devotee (one of the more early ones) he came to stay in the ashram for
some time. And Bhagavan would go and see him in his hut and scanned through his
belongings and asking questions about them. Most things were probably
manufactured in the West, so Sri Ramana was curious like a child.One day,
the western devotee had put a chair in the hut so Sri Ramana could sit on it
like the 'guru.' After this happened he never came again.I find there
is a lot to learn from sages and their teachings through their everyday
interactions with people and the world around them. When I read the Power of the
Presence many things became very clear to me. Things were put into perspective.
Sometimes it was like a was actually there. This is not so strange, the
Indonesian man, my first teacher once told me how he saw the last day of Sri
Ramana before his mahasamadhi. He could hear devotees whisper and later on the
chanting of Arunachala Shiva. It happened to him in a dream. When he told me
this tears ram down his cheeks and he was staring into empty space as if the
thing was still happening right in front of him. He was actually there.Also,
in Anandaaahram in Kerala, there was one brahmin, a very old man and I felt he
was a sage, a bhakta. He came to me and showed me a secret spot where I could
smoke! When I was smoking he was standing there watching me curiously like a
child. He was really looking after us. He ran around and brought us fruit,
towels etc. and was asking whether there was anything we needed and so on. He
was very curious and liked to talk with us. He looked like an orthodox South
Indian brahmin but really, he was as innocent as a child, he was really a child
of God. His Ram Nam was something I will never forget. I think he had a stroke
because his ability to speak was impaired. But his Ram Nam was very powerful. He
gave us darshan by his simple care and attention. I felt that Sri Ramana was
like this man. It is hard to explain. I am so very grateful these things
happened to us. This old brahmin, when he was near me I could feel my blind
spots. It was as if by his mere presence impurities just washed away and all I
could feel was ananda. Hence: the Power of the Presence. So by writing this
story I express my gratitude and offer it.

Ananthasree,
the maker of this video for Amma, wrote the
following description:

An offering at the feet of my guru. This montage is
symbolic of the intricacies of the guru-shishya relationship. It primarily
represents devotion, and the desperate longing to merge with the Beloved, or
God.

The song is Hallelujah, composed by Leonard Cohen and performed by
Jeff Buckley. The lyrics have a depth that can be explored again and again, and
deep religious and philosophical undertones, which moved me more than words can
say.

This is my visual poem to my guru. I put it out into the world in
the event that it is another persons poem as well. If it is, enjoy.

Hallelujah stems from the word halal, plus the particle u, meaning 'and'
or 'with', and jah, which is short for Yahweh, the Name of God. Halal means 'to
shine,' and is most often ascribed to stars.